An honest answer is a sign of true friendship.

Proverbs 24:26

Honesty is always the best policy. We’ve been taught that phrase since we were small children. Somewhere along the way though, we’re also taught about white lies and half truths. Then there’s also this philosophy about alternate truths which is just lying by another name and still another philosophy about brutal honesty where people are basically just rude to everyone and cover it up as being “honest”.

When the world starts throwing out more than one “truth”, it’s time to run quickly to the source of all truth, God.

A couple of years ago, I read a devotional about honesty and building trust in marriage, and I realized that the advice really applies to all of our human interactions and relationships. The devotional recommended that we all work on three areas in our relationships:

1. Authenticity – Be transparent. The same person you are with one person, be that person with every person.
2. Vulnerability – Be willing to discuss your failures, weaknesses, and sins. You can’t grow if you can’t address the needs you each have.
3. Credibility – Be truthful. You build trust by being honest with others about every area of life. Lies, even white lies, build deception between people and erode trust.

As I read those tips, I also reflected on Ephesians 2:8-9:

For it is by grace that you have been saved and not by your own works lest any should boast.

I realized that it’s a lot easier to be vulnerable when I remember that, regardless of my mistakes, I’ve been washed clean by the blood of the lamb. God knows what a screw up I can be and He STILL sent His Son to die on the cross for this hot mess so that I might live in eternity with Him as His daughter. He knows every flaw, every sin, every weakness and He STILL loves me. He still loves you too. Imagine if we all focused on the grace He provides as part of our relationships too.

It’s easier to be vulnerable, to be open, when we know we will receive love than it is when we fear we will receive judgement.

Titus 2:7-8 also came to mind:

Show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works, and in your teaching show integrity, dignity, and sound speech that cannot be condemned, so that an opponent may be put to shame, having nothing evil to say about us.

How will others know we are being authentic? Because we have developed credibility. We have walked with integrity.

Who we say we are is who we act like we are because it IS who we are and who we are is a person of integrity.

There’s no room in life for being one person with friend A and another person with friend B. If we are honest with our friends, but lie to our family, how long before our friends begin to worry that we lie to them too? If we gossip about friend A to friend B, how long before friend B stops feeling safe around us? Duplicity has no place in our lives. Ever.

Neither does lying, manipulation, truth-bending, game playing, or inconsistency. A person of integrity follows the direction of the Lord (Psalm 119:1). The Lord directs us to love God and love others (Matthew 22:37-38). God defines love for us in 1 Corinthians 13;

love is patient, kind; love does not envy, does not boast, is not proud, not rude, not self-seeking, not easily angered, does not hold grudges; love always rejoices with truth, protects, trusts, perseveres; love never fails.

Imagine how much more joy and security we would have in our families if spouses practiced these three tips with each other, with their children! Imagine how much more productive we would be in our workplaces if every employee and supervisor, in our schools if every educator and student had a relationship of authenticity, vulnerability, and credibility. Imagine how much more love and prosperity there would be in the world if we all walked with integrity and followed the tenets of truth and grace set forth by Jesus Christ!

Imagine if we all followed those three tips even as God Himself has modeled them for us:

1. Authenticity – I am who I say am. (Exodus 3:14)
2. Vulnerability – Word made flesh. (John 1:14, Isaiah 53:3-4)
3. Credibility – God keeps His promises. (Psalm 100:5, Joshua 21:45, Numbers 23:19, Isaiah 7:17/Matthew 1:18)

Merciful is our God to show us the path to peace and prosperity in our relationships!

Gracious is He to work with us again and again that we might be perfected (matured) in Him!